MORE ON THE 16TH 1804 DOLLAR PROVENANCE

In response to Doug Ward's comments in the latest E-Sylum, I would like to make a few comments.

I did read his article, as I am a Fellow of the ANS and read the mag each time I receive it.

His article was great! It had some documents that I had not seen.

However, I have some documents that he evidently has not seen. In 2004, at the John Ford literature sale by Kolbe, Kevin Lipton bought a folder of letters detailing the Woodin $50 Half Union story. Kevin gave it to Charles Anderson, who had one of the greatest pattern collections of all time (later sold to Bob Simspon for 23 million). On a train ride from Baltimore to D.C. with Kevin, I read all the letters.

Fast forward a few years and Charles Anderson found the folder and called me (I asked him at a Baltimore show about them and he didn't recall having them!).

He made copies and sent them to me and I wrote an article about the fifties published by the ANA in The Numismatist. (March 2013)

Yes, Haseltine and Nagy sold the Half Unions to Woodin, but as Mr. Ward noted, the two coins were from A. Loudon Snowden. Haseltine also sold the 1884 and 1885 Trade dollars that A. Loudon Snowden struck. However, I don't think they came from his father-in-law William Idler. I believe they were from Snowden, who left the Mint in the summer of 1885. I don't recall which Numismatist had the Nancy Oliver and Richard Kelly article, but they noted that Mint workmen had loaded two heavy trunks in a wagon and took them to Snowden's house just before he retired.

Some of the patterns that became the source for the Adams-Woodin 1913 book on patterns may have come from the Mint, as Mr. Ward suggests, but I believe that many of them came from Snowden, as the last letter in the trove from the Ford sale, noted that Woodin had settled with Col. Snowden.

So, we both may be correct....some came from the Mint and some from Snowden. He got his $20,000 back in coins (mostly patterns, of course), not in cash, as we both believe.

Also, I suspect as Mr. Ward does that Edgar Adams may have gotten the newly announced James A. Stack 1804 dollar. However, I am guessing the dollar also came from Snowden. His partner in crime, Henry R. Linderman, had one and one has to think that A. Loudon would have had one, too! Linderman's wife said that Henry had to make payments for his 1804 dollar! Me thinks the lady doth protest too much!

The "Hank and Al" show (a Craig Sholley sobriquet) was responsible for most of the irregular issues from the Mint (see Director James P. Kimball's 10 page diatribe in the 1887 Mint Report for elucidation, as he all but names these two).

 

To read the earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
ON THE PROVENANCE OF THE 16TH 1804 DOLLAR (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n35a14.html)
MORE ON THE 16TH 1804 DOLLAR PROVENANCE (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n36a12.html)
Snowden, Lindeman, and Edgar Adams : Snowden, Lindeman, and Edgar Adams (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n37a11.html)

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